


Love & Sandwiches

by didipickles



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Aging, Basically it's exactly what's on the tin, Fluff, M/M, Soft E Rating, Vignettes, a lil angsty, and then more fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-09
Updated: 2020-01-09
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:15:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22182418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/didipickles/pseuds/didipickles
Summary: David and Patrick's love story, told through a series of sandwiches.
Relationships: Patrick Brewer/David Rose
Comments: 61
Kudos: 236





	Love & Sandwiches

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thegrayness](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegrayness/gifts).



> gray, i know this is not the birthday fic i said i would write you, but i hope you like it anyway. you are a gift, and i'm lucky to count you as a friend.
> 
> as always, thank you to this-is-not-nothing for being an unstoppable force of validation and gentle direction.

Patrick liked order; he always had. He liked following a plan and seeing the results. He loved seeing all the individual elements come together to create something remarkable. Even a task as small as his current one—building the perfect sandwich—came with a specific list: lay out the bread, assemble the condiments, layer the meat and cheese just so, and on and on. Out of a dozen disparate parts, structure. 

As the sandwich came together, Patrick's thoughts drifted (as they so often did these days) to David Rose. Unlike the method and order Patrick so prized, David defied logic. Patrick longed to be able to categorize his feelings or describe what about David had him so utterly captivated, but part of what fascinated Patrick so much was David’s complete refusal to be classified. While David initially came across as scattered and unorganized, Patrick quickly learned that he was intelligent and bright and inventive. David floated easily between the masculine and feminine and nearly always broadcast an intoxicating confidence that Patrick longed to explore. David was  _ different.  _ David lived his life free of the neat boxes and categories and spreadsheets that had come to define Patrick's existence. 

_ David. _ Patrick realized he was smiling absently down at the half-made sandwich thinking about his new—coworker? Employer? Friend? At any rate, it was totally normal to bring food to your platonic work acquaintance, right?

On this morning’s hike, Patrick had set a record by pushing away thoughts of David for a full 11 minutes before letting himself be consumed by the same cycle of butterflies, doubts, questions, and wishes.

Before he could fall too deep into the same thought spiral that he’d been having for weeks, Patrick’s phone chimed with a message from David, asking what time he’d be at the store. They were only a few days from the “soft opening,” and David was spending more and more time pacing the floors and making microscopic changes to the product placement. Patrick could almost picture the tension pulling at David’s mouth.

He finished up the sandwich for David (on which he’d spent at least 5 more minutes than his own) and carefully sliced it diagonally—a habit from his mother that he couldn’t bear to lose. He’d paid enough attention to know the David liked a classic ham and cheese, and Patrick had even sprung for dijon mustard because he knew David would be impressed. God, his crush was probably so glaringly obvious.

When he arrived, Patrick opened his mouth to speak but stopped. David was motionless, standing next to the center table facing away from the store’s front with his hands on his hips. It was odd to see him so still. David was normally like a hummingbird: constant and unstoppable momentum that brought his own beauty to the things around him, making them even more beautiful.

About double the acceptable amount of time to stare at your coworker’s back passed before Patrick realized he needed to somehow let David know he was there. He kept expecting David to move, to turn and see him, to shoot him one of those small sideways smiles. But David stayed perfectly still, and Patrick hated to break the moment. He let himself take another ten seconds to look—to note how David’s hair looked different from this angle, to wonder how the extra fabric on his pants worked, to admire the broadness of his shoulders. Embarrassment eventually pushed Patrick into clearing his throat. David jumped a bit and turned quickly. 

“Oh my god, I didn’t hear you come in! You’re so—stealthy.”

Patrick grinned and shrugged as he walked around to the service counter and set down his bag. “An essential part of business school. I excelled at ‘How to Sneak Up on Your Business Partner 101.’” 

David scoffed and shook his head. He turned back around to the back wall, and Patrick followed his gaze, trying to parse out what exactly was so perplexing that demanded David’s attention. David spoke, his voice a mix of frustration and nerves. “I can’t decide if I want to reorganize the products on the far side so they are closer to the cash.”

“David,” Patrick said gently, opening his bag and pulling out the two sandwiches, “you’ve reorganized the back wall four times.”

“Okay, but it has to be  _ perfect,  _ so maybe I need to reorganize a fifth time.” He sounded irritable, but luckily Patrick was prepared for that.

“Why don’t you take another look at it after you have something to eat?” Patrick asked. He’d hoped for something between casual and genteel, but his voice unhelpfully cracked in the middle of the sentence.

David didn’t turn back to him. “I don’t want to go to the cafe. I saw Roland walk in twenty minutes ago.”   
  
“Oh, I—” Patrick stopped and took a breath. Steady does it. “I actually brought you a sandwich.”   
  
At that David whipped around with a flourish like a cartoon character. Patrick could have sworn he saw motion lines vibrating off of him. “You—brought me a sandwich.” David repeated. His eyes had gone slightly narrow. “Why?”

Patrick shrugged and pushed the sandwich out across the counter. “I was making one for myself, and I had extra, so. I, uh, thought you might want some.” When David didn’t respond, Patrick went on quickly. “It’s ham and cheese, and I uh, put on some dijon mustard.”

David took a cautious step forward. “That’s. Well, that’s very nice.” David’s face seemed unable to follow a single trajectory, instead broadcasting several conflicting emotions in rapidfire dissonance. Eventually he landed on a half-smile, and Patrick gestured over toward himself.

“C’mon, come eat it or I will.”

“Well  _ that  _ definitely isn’t happening,” David said, coming around the counter and sidling up next to Patrick. 

As they ate, they bumped and jostled and joked and teased, and Patrick felt another flicker of hope. Maybe he wasn’t alone in his feelings. Maybe he  _ could  _ work up the courage to do something. 

Soon.

***

"Okay, but someone  _ else  _ was always there to do it!" David protested. Patrick had been teasing him mercilessly for 5 minutes in Ray's kitchen, and David still couldn't wipe the ridiculous smile from his face. It was just. The past week since his birthday had been pretty near perfect, aside from that first day and the corpse in the building where he  _ lived.  _

Patrick flipped the grilled cheese sandwich over in the pan and turned back to David, his arms wrapping around David as though it was the most natural thing in the world. All these casual touches were probably bad for David's health; he could feel his pulse spike every single time—not that he was complaining about Patrick's near obsession with being in constant physical contact. 

The shit-eating grin was back on Patrick's face. "I just find it hard to believe that you have  _ never  _ made your own grilled cheese," he said, his eyes doing that  _ thing  _ with the volume and the fondness. David kind of wanted to ask what exactly Patrick saw when he looked at David like that, but mostly he was terrified of the answer. 

David rolled his eyes and fought to keep his own face under control. It already felt like the smile had cracked his entire face open. "So you've said. Seven times."

"You could always give me something else to do," Patrick replied. His voice was calm, but in the week they'd been together—dating, seeing each other, making out, whatever the label was—David had gotten pretty good at reading beneath Patrick's voice. 

"Something else to do, hm?" David asked, his own hands wrapping solidly around Patrick's shoulders. "Like a spreadsheet of vendors, or…?"

"Mm, I do love a good spreadsheet," Patrick said. He smoothly turned them so David was pressing back against the countertop. Thank god Ray was out at poker or a meeting or a date—David couldn't actually remember. 

Patrick pressed in close, his nose dragging up along David's neck. Fuck. Patrick had gone from 'let's go slow' to 'let's make out every possible second' in record time, and David counted himself obscenely lucky because Patrick was so  _ good  _ at it. David's eyes closed as Patrick mouthed at his jaw and then worked his way to David's lips. They both sighed a little at the beginning of the kiss, which made them laugh against each other's lips. That was new, too. David had laughed more while kissing Patrick than he ever had with another partner. It was just so goddamn  _ fun  _ with Patrick.

Until Patrick took David's lip between his teeth, and then David wasn't laughing at all. David tightened his arms around Patrick and pulled him closer, their thighs slotting together just right as Patrick kissed up into David. It often felt like Patrick was trying to consume him, and god David wanted to let him. They had just started to grind together, giving David another glimpse of what Patrick was working with under his jeans, when Patrick pulled back with a look of alarm on his face. In a flash Patrick was out of David’s arms and in front of the stove, cursing and turning it off. 

_ Oh _ , the sandwich. Now that Patrick wasn’t clouding David’s immediate senses, he could make out a faint smokey smell. Patrick flipped the sandwich over and revealed the completely charred bottom piece of bread. 

“So, is this normally a step you include in making your grilled cheese?” David asked, turning to Patrick. 

“Generally I don’t have my b—you here to distract me when I make it,” Patrick said, clearly flustered as he picked up the burned sandwich and threw it away. David would examine the rush of butterflies he felt at what Patrick  _ almost  _ said later. For now, he moved behind Patrick and pulled him against his chest, setting his chin on Patrick’s shoulder. 

“Maybe we should just go to the cafe?” David suggested. Patrick sighed and agreed.

It wasn’t until they were seated and thanking Twyla for the menus that David realized it was  _ exactly  _ one week since they were here on the date that David didn’t know was a date. The thought nearly bowled him over. An entire week. The happiest one of David’s life, if he sat down and examined it. 

They both ordered grilled cheese sandwiches and as Twyla turned to go, Patrick stopped her. “Could we also get an order of mozzarella sticks?” David gave him an alarmed raised eyebrow—they were  _ awful  _ last week—but Patrick just smiled and went on. “David and I have been dating for a week, so that calls for something extra special.”

Alarms went off immediately in David’s head. It was bad luck to celebrate just one week of dating, wasn’t it? Truthfully, David didn’t want to celebrate  _ any  _ anniversaries, because that would make it harder when things inevitably came to an end. But Patrick was smiling at him from across the booth and leaning forward slightly and he just looked so…happy. David couldn’t panic too much when Patrick was looking at him like that. 

“Don’t you think it’s a little early for marking time?” David asked, unable to let it go entirely.

“Hm. So what is the proper amount of time to wait before celebrating? A month?” Patrick countered. 

“God. No. Please, let’s just not do the whole—anniversary thing,” David said. Even the word felt like he was challenging fate. As if  _ he  _ would have any anniversary of significance with someone like Patrick anyway.

“Oh, but David. I already had so many plans.” Patrick was teasing again. Patrick was always teasing, but never mean. God, David liked him  _ so much.  _

Just then, the mozzarella sticks arrived at the table, looking as questionable as they had last week. Patrick grabbed one and held it up, waiting. Rolling his eyes and biting down his smile, David picked one up and tapped it against Patrick’s. 

“One week,” Patrick said. 

***

Eating while driving could be managed. Eating while driving with David simply could not. Patrick had been so careful to make relatively mess-free sandwiches for them to eat as they drove out to visit a vendor in Oakdale, but he hadn’t counted on how wildly David’s hands would move while he ate, or how much Patrick would be laughing as he tried to drive and eat at the same time.

“I tried to make it sound like it was this great cleansing experience, and they were basically shoving me back at my family,” David said, explaining to Patrick about his time at the Amish farm they just passed. Patrick wasn’t sure what was funnier: the idea of David  _ on  _ an Amish farm, or the way David told the story with such relish. It was obvious that a lot of emotional turmoil underwrote that particular story, but David had such a flair for storytelling, and Patrick couldn’t help laughing. 

He was  _ happy,  _ was the thing. It had been just over three months since they started dating, and things were…things were as good as they’d ever been. All the trust they’d built in those early days at the store as coworkers was still there. All the initial heat of the first few weeks of dating and exploring each other and learning each other—that was definitely still there too. And David made Patrick happy. Patrick was finally starting to understand what he was capable of feeling and exactly what he  _ hadn’t _ been feeling in his last relationship.

So what if jelly had seeped out of his sandwich onto his jeans? And who cared if David (somehow) got flecks of peanut butter on the window? Patrick was happy, and he was with David. That’s all that really mattered.

***

David was loved. He loved someone, and he was loved back. 

The thought was simultaneously obvious and unfathomable. After two decades of making himself smaller to fit into someone else’s life, or pretending to be something he wasn’t, or hating himself from the moment he woke up to the moment he fell asleep—he was loved, and in love, and happy.

The truth of the matter was he’d been in love a lot longer than just the 16 hours or so that had passed since he said it out loud. He suspected he’d been falling in love for months, but hadn’t allowed himself to think too deeply about it. But then yesterday—Patrick had looked at him and teased him and said “I love you” like he meant it, like it wasn’t a life-altering declaration for both of them. And it had taken David an afternoon of opening himself up to  _ Ted  _ of all people, but then he’d said it back. Patrick’s entire face had opened like a flower reaching for the sun at hearing it, and god, David  _ did  _ love him, he loved him so much it ached in his chest.

Last night they were blissfully alone in the house thanks to Ray’s dedication to attending every closet organization conference in a 100-kilometer radius. They spent hours and hours trading “I love you” back and forth, finding new ways to whisper it, fresh patches of skin that needed the words pressed into them. David assumed it would be hard to repeat, but it wasn’t. Not when Patrick was giggling against him, letting David take up all the space he wanted in the bed, in the room, in the world. Not when Patrick said it close and quiet like a secret, and then again in a ridiculous sing-song. 

Sex with Patrick had been good from the start. Over time it had gotten better, and last night was—last night had felt like something entirely new. This morning, David woke up with Patrick’s lips pressed against the hollow of his throat. They kissed for long lazy minutes until everything turned urgent, and then Patrick had fucked David soft and slow and kept him on edge for what felt like hours before they both fell apart together. 

Patrick had fallen right back asleep, so now David had the luxury of looking at him without interruption. He was beautiful. The straight line of Patrick’s nose contrasted perfectly with his plush lower lip, sticking out a bit in a small pout as Patrick slept. David lifted a light finger and traced it down Patrick’s nose to his lip to his chin, and then back up.  _ We love each other.  _ It was a lot to sit with in bed at 11 am.

David pushed himself up quietly and dressed in a pair of sweats and a t-shirt before giving Patrick a last look and leaving the room. He padded downstairs to the kitchen and set about gathering ingredients. As he assembled everything in a neat row in the order he’d need it, he smiled. Patrick would be so proud of his sandwich organizational skills.

Inevitably as he made the sandwiches, his thoughts drifted to the man upstairs. The man who loved him like it was easy. Who loved him like David wasn’t too capricious or selfish or broken to deserve it. Patrick just  _ did.  _ It was…well, it was incredible, really.

“You’re making me food?” 

David turned to see Patrick in a pair of sweats and nothing else. They had another hour before they needed to be at work, and David was highly tempted to leave the sandwiches where they were and drag Patrick back upstairs. But—he hadn’t eaten yet today and that was incorrect. “I  _ am _ making you food.”

Patrick moved behind him and wrapped his arms around David’s front, draping across him and kissing the skin right above the collar of his shirt. “I love you.”

David’s hand slipped and the knife clattered to the counter. As much as they’d said it last night and again this morning, it was definitely going to take some getting used to. “I love you, too.”

It was admittedly harder to finish making a sandwich when your sleepy half-naked boyfriend who loved you was glued to your back, but David managed it and took both plates to the table. As soon as they sat, Patrick’s foot was rubbing up David’s calf, and David had to laugh. “So apparently saying ‘I love you’ works as an aphrodisiac for you, if the last day is any indication.”

Patrick took a giant bite and spoke with his mouth full, the fucking troll. “May-ee you’re the afro-ee-siac,” he mumbled. 

David  _ wanted  _ to comment on how disgusting Patrick was being, maybe point out the bit of lettuce hanging from the corner of his mouth, but he just couldn’t quite find it in him. 

***

Patrick had always been a dirty fighter. When he was a kid and got into it with his friends, he turned into a version of himself that he despised: poking and prodding exactly where he knew it would hurt most. It had been even worse with Rachel, because she fought just as dirty. A decade together meant they knew each other’s weak spots. They’d needle and pick and slowly twist the knife until they were both left bleeding out. Time would pass, the wound would close just enough to keep them alive, and then it was a matter of time before someone picked at the scab. Patrick hated it. He hated who he became, he hated what he was capable of doing, and he hated the way it always felt good in the moment.

He’d never hated himself more than he did this morning. 

God, and it had been so  _ stupid,  _ too. Last night, David had been pacing in the kitchen while Patrick sat at the table working. David was thinking out loud about some small detail or other for the wedding, and Patrick had just—he’d been  _ mean.  _ Dirty, ugly, flat-out mean to the man he loved more than anything in the entire world.

“If you’re not going to include me in the actual decision-making process for  _ our wedding,  _ could you maybe shut up about it for five minutes while I’m trying to work?”

David’s eyes widened like he’d been shot and he stopped dead in his tracks. “Excuse me?” His voice sounded like it might shatter.

But Patrick hadn’t stopped. “I said,” he went on, letting a venom he hadn’t used in years drip into his voice, “that if you don’t care what I think about the wedding plans, maybe you could stop talking about it for five seconds. I’m trying to finish something.”

David blinked. And blinked again. Patrick had seen David’s face relax over the past two years, soften into something open and vulnerable and exquisite. And here in their kitchen—no,  _ Patrick’s  _ kitchen, because they still didn’t live together—Patrick was watching David’s face harden and close off again. Because of him. 

“I have asked you at least fifty times to help me with decisions, Patrick,” David said. Every consonant was hard, every word dangerous. “When we picked the cake, and you told me to trust my palate. When we chose colors, and you told me I’m the creative one. When I tried to get your opinion on fucking  _ chairs,  _ and you shrugged. You told me you wanted me to make it beautiful.” David looked like he was starting to shake, and Patrick already felt a twinge of self-hatred creeping in. “So don’t you  _ dare  _ sit there and pretend I’ve been some—some fucking groomzilla when you haven’t helped me do one single fucking thing for  _ our  _ wedding.” 

Neither of them moved, aside from David’s heavy breaths and slightly shaking hands. Patrick’s pulse rushed in his ears, hot shame flooding his entire body. “I—”

“No.” David lifted a hand. “Don’t. Just—don’t say anything. I’m going back to the motel for the night.” And then David left. He didn’t stop to look at Patrick once. Just left.

The night had passed in bursts of torture. He and David had argued before, had full-blown fights, but it had never felt like this. Normally they were fighting  _ together.  _ Now, Patrick was completely alone. He tossed and turned for hours, knowing that this was entirely his fault. David had been right, Patrick  _ had _ passed almost all of the planning to David. And his outburst was completely unfair. David didn’t know that Patrick had spent twenty minutes on the phone with his Great-Aunt Joanne trying to explain directions, and then another fifteen with Great-Uncle Martin talking about hotel accommodations. Or that Patrick had just heard from one of his closest cousins that he wasn’t going to be able to make it. Or that Patrick hadn’t slept well last night. No, David didn’t know any of that, and Patrick had lashed out at him. He hadn’t meant it at all, but he was feeling agitated and like he was losing control, so he just…snapped. 

Fuck, he was such an idiot, and David wasn’t responding to texts or calls. They hadn’t spent a night apart in weeks, and the apartment felt too big now without David taking up space in it.

Now it was morning, and part of Patrick wondered if David would even be at the store today. Patrick deserved it. He deserved to be left hanging, to run the store alone, to sit in the shame of what he’d said for no reason at all. The ugliest parts of himself that he thought he’d left behind were still with him, and he hated it. Finding the person who made him feel right didn’t strip away the worst elements that still hid inside.

Patrick paced the kitchen, retracing the steps David had taken last night. On his fifteenth turn, an idea struck him. He quickly grabbed his phone and typed a message.

**_I’ll bring lunch today. I’m so sorry, David. I love you._ **

Slowly, carefully, Patrick pulled out all the pieces and started to assemble the same sandwich he’d brought David before they started dating. As he layered the ham and cheese and added the dijon mustard David loved, Patrick thought about who he was that day two years ago. He’d been nervous and giddy and had almost felt a bit reckless, like he was surely showing too much of his heart. And now, David was a permanent fixture in his life. He’d been so,  _ so  _ lucky to find David, and even luckier that David had taken a chance on him after a lifetime of being told he was too much or not enough. And now Patrick had gone and practically said the same damn thing.

When the sandwich was finished, Patrick gave it his signature diagonal slice. It wasn’t the biggest olive branch, but it was a start. Maybe an apology sandwich wouldn’t fix anything. But Patrick had no choice but to move forward and try with the man he loved. He took a deep breath and headed to the store.

***

After being open for nearly seven years, Rose Apothecary was expanding, which meant talking to vendors about changing contracts, increasing orders, discussing logistics, and a hundred other tasks. Since Patrick loved the boring minutiae of running a store (thank god David married a business major), he was handling that aspect of things while David networked and met with clients. 

David couldn’t stop smiling as he walked back to the car. The meeting had gone…unbelievably well, actually. The whole morning had been a success. He’d never admit that anything was worth leaving the house at 7 am, but this round of vendor visits was putting up a pretty good fight. He’d secured 4 different extended contracts, and it was barely noon.

Patrick had insisted on making David lunch for the road, citing something about the importance of continuing to serve each other. Five years of marriage hadn’t even remotely dulled the shine of their relationship, so David always got a little antsy when Patrick started using couples therapy language at home. But if Patrick wanted to make David a sandwich, it wasn’t like David was going to say no.

David opened the little lunch bag Patrick had bought him a few years ago, remembering how practical Patrick had sounded.  _ “It’ll keep things fresh when you have to be on the road, or you can use it to bring in food from home instead of walking to the cafe,”  _ he’d said.

As David pulled the sandwich out of the bag, he was surprised when a note fluttered out. But then again, he really shouldn’t be surprised anymore. Patrick had started it about a year ago, leaving little notes in places David didn’t expect. David would get up to use the bathroom in the middle of the night and find that at some point Patrick had affixed a sticky note to the mirror with something like “Hello Gorgeous” or “Damn, look at you” written on it. More than once David had gone into the stockroom at the store and pulled out a box to take out front and found a folded piece of paper with a list of things Patrick loved about him. 

David reached over for the note and opened it up, already smiling.

**_Hi there, handsome. I hope you’re having an excellent day and that you aren’t too mad that I kept you up an extra 10 minutes last night to give you a pretty spectacular blow job. You deserved it. You do so much for us and the store, and I’m lucky to call you my husband and my partner. I love you._ **

**_\- P_ **

It was probably silly to cry about a simple note, but David couldn’t help thinking about who he’d been ten years ago. The notion that someone would bother leaving him little love notes would have been utterly absurd, and David wanted to wrap that person up and whisper “just wait; you have no idea how worth it this will all be.” 

After wiping away a tear and laughing at his own ridiculousness, David sent Patrick a text with a heart emoji. Still smiling, he picked up the sandwich that Patrick had carefully crafted at 6:30 in the morning just so David could sleep an extra few minutes. 

***

_ “Air Canada flight 8114 to San Jose is in its final boarding stages, please make your way to gate E87.” _

_ “Flight 1677, Delta Airlines with service to Minneapolis will begin boarding in five minutes at gate E79.” _

_ “Would passenger Brandon Firla please report to the nearest gate agent? Passenger Brandon Firla to the nearest gate agent.” _

Patrick sighed and took another bite of his thoroughly disappointing turkey club that he'd spent  _ seventeen dollars  _ on. Airports had a way of conning you into paying them for breathing, he thought for the tenth time today. If David were here, he'd shake his head and poke Patrick in the side and say he was getting awfully crotchety for someone who didn't turn 50 for another month. 

Patrick smiled as he thought of his husband, just one plane ride away. As much as Patrick had enjoyed the week in Vancouver celebrating his cousin's daughter's wedding, he missed David. Almost on instinct, he started twirling his wedding ring. Nearly eighteen years had left the skin beneath it smooth. It was fitting, really, since David had done the same thing for Patrick: smoothed him out, made him softer, left an indelible mark.

For perhaps the millionth time, Patrick wondered how he got so lucky. Before David, Patrick had been mostly happy. He loved his family, had hobbies he enjoyed, and derived great pleasure from his professional successes. But with David, Patrick's life had filled out in a way he didn't know was possible. He learned more about his own capacity to love and be loved. David taught him what it meant to be cherished. Things in their marriage hadn't always been easy, and Patrick was certain there would be occasional difficult days ahead, but it didn't frighten him. David chose him every single day, and it still felt like a miracle.

Almost as if on cue, Patrick's phone buzzed on the table, lighting up with a candid picture of David laughing in their kitchen. The laugh lines around his eyes had deepened in the twenty years Patrick had known him, and his hair was now more salt than pepper. He was still the most beautiful thing Patrick had ever seen.

Grinning, Patrick pushed the rest of his sandwich away and picked up the phone.

"Your sandwiches are much better than airport ones," he said in greeting.

"Well that's a given," David replied, warm and familiar and perfect.

***

Instrumental jazz played quietly in the kitchen as David stood at the counter, rearranging everything Patrick had set out not two minutes before. He heard Patrick's tell-tale sigh from behind him and smiled down at the two pieces of bread he'd just pulled out.

"You're not allowed to sigh at me on my birthday, Patrick," David said, glancing back over his shoulder. 

"I think we have years of evidence suggesting that's not the case," Patrick said behind him, and then David felt Patrick's warmth pressing against his back. 

"Okay, but today is different. I'm seventy and you need to respect your elders." David turned in Patrick's arms and smiled. 

"I thought I respected you plenty this morning," Patrick practically purred back, leaning up for a light kiss. It was more laughing into each other's mouths, but David kind of liked that better.

"You're ridiculous and distracting," David murmured, not making any move to get away.

"I'm supposed to be making you lunch, birthday boy. So at this point I think  _ you _ are being the distraction."

David feigned an annoyed huff and then kissed Patrick's nose. "Fine. You make me lunch, and I'll make you lunch. Then we can keep each other in line."

"Oh, we're  _ very  _ good at that," Patrick said as he released David, waggling his eyebrows.

"God, you're such a horny old man," David laughed. 

They set up side by side and fell into a practiced rhythm as they made sandwiches for each other. Later there would be a party and a fancy dinner because Alexis positively  _ insisted,  _ but for now it was just David and Patrick. In a way, it always had been.

About halfway through sandwich assembly, the song switched and Patrick pulled David into the middle of the kitchen floor. Automatically David's hands went up to Patrick's shoulders as Patrick's arms wound around his middle. 

"Happy birthday, David," Patrick whispered. Even after all these years, David sometimes was still taken aback by how open Patrick's love was, how it radiated from his eyes and his hands and his smile.

"Happy anniversary, Patrick."

The sandwiches lay forgotten on the counter as David swayed in his husband's arms. 

**Author's Note:**

> so this came about after i had a dream that i was in a period film called "Love & Sandwiches" and told the patrons of the rosebudd. i don't remember anything about the dream, but thanks for pushing me yet again to write something i never would have written without your encouragement.
> 
> follow me on tumblr @thedidipickles and twitter @didipickes2

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] Love & Sandwiches](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24315781) by [monstrous_eliza (ships_to_sail)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ships_to_sail/pseuds/monstrous_eliza)




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